


Steve Rogers is a Time Travelling Asshole, Purple

by K_Popsicle



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Canon Compliant, Deception, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Hurt No Comfort, IMO, Non-Linear Narrative, Relationship Horror, Time Travel, lying
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-04
Updated: 2019-09-04
Packaged: 2020-10-06 20:35:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,948
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20513120
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/K_Popsicle/pseuds/K_Popsicle
Summary: Peggy thinks Steve is dead, until he shows up at her door a year after the war ends.





	Steve Rogers is a Time Travelling Asshole, Purple

**Author's Note:**

  * For [seinmit](https://archiveofourown.org/users/seinmit/gifts).

> There are more typos in this than there is plot. If you aren’t prepared that’s not on me.  
I don’t like the Endgame coda endings. I, in fact, despise them and think they are character assassination. This is the result.

There’s something wrong with Steve Rogers. She knows it in her bones, intuition maybe.

“There’s no such thing as intuition.” Howard dismisses in his quick fire way, “Gut instinct is just your brain noticing something and being too simple to tell you what it is.”

“So you believe me?” She asks a little desperate and Howard catches the tone and pulls his head up to actually look at her. Whatever he see’s has him push back from the table, the little wheeled stool rolling until he’s got a full view of her.

“Peggy,” he says seriously, “if you say there’s something wrong with Steve, there’s something wrong with him.” It shouldn’t be enough, she’s seen the rotting death of children on battlefields and come up swinging, but something unclenches in her chest - a fear of not being believed - a fear that she’s going crazy - and it’s not until she feels something on her chin and flicks it away that she realise realises she’s crying. She doesn’t want to be. Panicked she tries to wipe the evidence away with a shaking hand. But there’s no way to hide it’s happening with Howard looking right at her and her desperation not to is like a knife that lodges down her throat and slices everything in its path. It’s not even anything big, it’s such a little thing, not enough to bother Howard, but she can’t stop them, and the more she tries the more they come, until she can barely breath, and Howard’s wrapped her up in his arms promising her he’ll help. Promising her he’ll kill him. He’ll kill Captain America just because she thinks something’s wrong with her husband.

Peggy brushes her hair skilfully. She has a date. It’s the strangest idea, dating. She’s been living hand to mouth, through austerity and blood shed, then the political clean up that follows, hunting down war criminals and filtering out double agents for over a year. This new era has men who shake and scream at ghosts, but she’s going out dancing. There’s a flutter, a pulse, and she’s already halfway in love because he asked. He looked at her, and he saw someone worth asking. She can’t remember the last time she felt this excited.

Steve doesn’t like TV, says he’s waiting for it to be in colour and everyone laughs. He always looks sheepish, tucks his hands in like he’s demure and makes another joke. Steve’s the life of the party with his broad shoulders, all American blonde hair and a smile to light the room. But it’s his cooking that seems to keep the crowds coming. Peggy isn’t sure how she got this lucky but she knows she is as she shuts the door on the party and takes another look at the Russian communiqués they need deciphered for their field agents.

She’s half buried in it, flicking open the Russian dictionary to check congregations and tenses when the study door rolls open. She goes to pull the decoy documents over them as she turns to smile at the intruder, but it’s just Steve. Steve whose rolled his sleeves up, and is looking at her fondly.

“Are you neglecting our guests?” She checks, but it sounds quiet outside. It’s getting dark outside.

“They ate us out of house and home and skedaddled.”

“Pity. I’d meant to say hello to the new tenants.” She hums and gets back to the task at hand, but he comes around behind her, he takes up so much space that she can practically feel it, but it still surprises her when he leans down over her shoulder, his arms laying over her own and kisses the side of her neck. “Steve.” She warns, but she’s willing to be persuaded to a small distraction. Her brain is getting to the point where she’ll have to take a break, and as appealing as a cup of tea is, her husband is a much greater temptation.

He huffs behind her ears, tickles the hairs on her brow and then props his chin on her head. She swats at him for that, and he laughs and backs up.

“Help or leave.” She orders, just for that, and he tightens his arms around her and props his chin onto her shoulder instead.

“What are we doing?” He murmurs, and she cranes her neck to see him looking at the papers, eyes flicking over everything in a rapid fire way that’s all super solider serum at work. No disrespect to her husband, but there’s only so fast an unenhanced brain can work. “I think you’ve got the syntax wrong on these two,” he taps the papers and presses another kiss to her neck, “I think it’s time for a break, I’ll put the kettle on.”

“Thank you.” She replies robotically, staring at the sentences because they are wrong, and she didn’t know he spoke more than ten words in Russian. “Super soldiers.” She grumbles.

“I can hear you.” He calls back teasing, and so she repeats the insult with a flourish of the kind of Russian they both learnt around a fire when Gabe was trying to impress them all. Steve laughs boisterously and she feels light and thanks god that he came back to her.

“Margaret.” He calls her, like standing on formality is the thing you do when you show up at someone’s door without warning a year after you dove a plane nose first into the artic.

“Steve.” She repeats, like a surprised record.

He’s holding flowers. He’s bought her flowers, and he’s... alive.

“Steve.” She repeats. Her knuckles turn white on the door frame, and part of her is shouting ‘_Get out, get out, get out. You are going to die if you don’t move._’

He looks bashful as he holds out the flowers, “I ah, didn’t know what kind you like.”

She slams the door in his face and runs for the fire escape. She forgets all about dancing.

Peggy doesn’t have time to mourn. She cries over the radio, loses a piece of herself when it cuts out on her and leaves only the echo of gunfire and shouting and the sound of a softly closing door. But she brushes the tears back, reminds herself that there are still men dying out there, makes it three steps to the door and loses her resolve for one waving moment, braces herself against the door itself to keep people out, and gets herself under control.

She does lose that control again until Howard asks her how their boy did and she means to say it plainly, means to say “he’s dead,” but the words get trapped in a choked off noise and she realises she hasn’t had to say it before now, and now her stupid body can’t even manage this.

He knows, of course he does, looks pained and then does what they all do: gets back to work. Gets that spark in his eye when she reports on the situation factually and with no fanfare, and starts to spark up her own hope.

But she knows better. Unlike Howard she’s been on the frontlines. People always die easier than you’d think and she’s not going to lie to herself like that. She can’t live with a lie.

“No, Peggy!” He cuts her off at the window, between her and that escape, and she knows that was too fast, but it’s not the first time she’s fought someone faster than her. “It’s me.” He promises. Peggy twists and goes for the gun in the dresser. She shots before she even registers that he’s got his shield. It’s the only thing that stops the bullet from hitting it’s mark between his eyes.

“Talk.” She orders, the door is to her right, he’s closer to the window. He’ll be able to get between her and the door if she makes another run for it, but she’s armed now and she’ll face whatever this fight is.

But instead of anything she expects he lowers the shield and looks apologetic. “I shouldn’t have surprised you like that, I just knew... I had to tell you, tonight. But how do you tell the woman you love that you’re not dead?”

She doesn’t lower her gun, but he’s very convincing, and the real danger is that she wants to be convinced.

“What a waste.” Connell Philips grunts at the empty coffin being lowered into its Arlington plot. Peggy stands below an umbrella with all the dignity of a woman being watched by vultures. Howard has stumbled late and drunk, a manic gleam to his eyes. She regrets requesting his company, before all the press down the hill, and all the politicians making a show of being on hand to show their respects the entire thing is a farce. Peggy wants to send Steve off with the dignity he deserves, maybe Howard does too.

They throw a handful of dirt each, it’s muddy and clings to their fingers, and then Howard takes her the long way across the cemetery, away from the press and into his private limo.

“Take us to Julia’s, Jarvis.” He orders, and pours them both a whiskey.

Peggy throws her back to get the bitter taste of fakery off her pallet.

“He’d have hated it.” She tells Howard, and he agrees and pours her another.

They spend the night at Julia’s, then the next day on the floor of Howards nearest apartment looking for the bottom of whiskey bottles. They find more than they should.

“I think he was the best man you or I will ever know,” Howard says in the middle of his tirade about- well Peggy’s not sure what he was talking about because she’d been laying backwards on the couch watching the gold painted stars on his dome roof, but his voice is softer than normal, and Peggy knows exactly what he means.

“To a good man.” She agrees and raises her glass up with loose fingers. Howard is too far a way to clink glasses but he tips his towards her in agreement and they both drink and say goodbye one last time.

Howard pulls his leather gloves off as he steps through the door. He looks sombre as he steps up beside her at the one way mirror.

“Well?” She asks softly. She’s ready for any response, at least she thinks she is.

“It’s him.” He says but without the tone of excitement she would expect. Instead he’s frowning. “Every piece of scientific equipment that exists in this world says that man is Steve Rogers. Everything he says and does is Steve Rogers. As far as I can tell it’s him.”

“But?” She watches as Steve pulls his shirt on, the pull of muscles, the way he’s assessing the room. He _moves_ like Steve. He looks at her like Steve. But she’s been tricked before and she cannot do that to herself again.

“But nothing.” He dismisses quick-fire. “As far as I can tell that’s our boy, and I can’t find a single thing wrong with him.”

“And that’s bad?” She’s not sure how to feel, mostly she just feels numb.

“I thought he was a miracle of science before, but this is a whole new ballpark. He walked across the Arctic with nothing but his shield and there’s not a scratch on him, not a thing out of place.” Howard looks annoyed, “if you don’t marry him I might.”

“Howard.” She warns because she barely knows Steve. Barely had a chance. She wanted to, was ready to, thought he might be someone who she could love as well as he would love her, but it was always a hope, a possibility. She’s not ready to commit to forever when they’ve barely begun to know each other.

“At least take him for a test drive. Trust me, I was there for the full physicals. In itself that has to be worth it.”

She’s used to Howards candour, but she still feels flushed at the implication. She hadn’t been there for the physical, of course, but the nurses who had been were school yard gossips and nothing had been left to the imagination. Knowing what she knows she wouldn’t put it past Howard to try and expand Steve’s horizons either, given half the chance.

“Ah,” Steve taps on the glass politely, smiling sheepishly, “I have super hearing.”

Steve buys her flowers on their anniversary. Smiles and kisses her and take her hand and slow dances her through the living room. She laughs and spins and thinks about how lucky she is. To have this. To have him. She can’t imagine her life any other way.

When he takes her to bed its where they spend the day. She laughs at him and reminds him that they both have work, but he bullheadedly pretends they don’t have anywhere else in the world to be. For a few hours they live in their bubble where the world doesn’t need them, and they don’t need to be busy.

She loves it, loves him, loves the days they get to forget about reality for a while.

Steve goes through SHIELD’s training like he was born to it. There’s no wasted movement, not hesitation. He jumps from one place to the next like a dancer trained in it. He treats walls like stepping stones, obstacles like aides, enemies like shield cover. Peggy has never seen anyone fight like that before. It’s not that it’s vicious, or underhanded, she’s seen all of those before. It’s the fluidity of it.

Somewhere between the artic and her front door Steve’s entire fighting style has changed. He just laughs when she mentions it, says he’s had a lot of time to think since they last met. Prioritise.

He says it to her with something warm in his eyes, something that’s for her that she wants, but not in the middle of the office with the other agents waiting for their turn to use the facilities.

“Very good.” She says and signs him up to go on missions. Nothing that will give him too much information, nothing that she wouldn’t give to any new recruit who could punch through a wall. She doesn’t trust him, it’s too new, but she’s getting there.

When he brings home one of the most wanted war criminals on their list, covered in blood and with two defectors who don’t speak a word of English, she smiles at him and agrees to dinner when he asks.

Howard comes when she calls. She doesn’t know how long it takes him, because time has broken somewhere and she’s not the one who broke it.

“Peggy,” he calls as he barrels into the house. He’s got his gun out. She didn’t even know he still had one, but he’s there ready to shoot anything that looks suspect as he comes over to her.

She’s on the couch staring at the things she’s spread out on the table.

“I don’t know why he kept them.” She tells Howard, and her voice sounds distant, like it’s not really her.

“Peggy.” He repeats and when she doesn’t look at him he looks at what she’s staring at. It’s not much, a photograph of Peggy, streaks of grey in her hair, one child tucked in under her hold, another cradled in her right arm, and a man she barely recognises standing behind her like a guardian. It’s a family portrait. She’s seen so many like it. But it’s _her_ family portrait, but also not. There’s other things too, electronics she’s cracked open to look at the insides of, technology she’s never seen the likes of. A metal briefcase with soft rubber foam and six empty spots. But it’s the photo she keeps coming back to. It’s been folded, and folded. It was at the bottom of the box when she’d found it in the crawl space. She hadn’t even been looking for it, but she’s a spy, of course she looked.

Howard makes a noise, “What in the devil is that?” He asks and ignores the photo of her and the family she doesn’t have, picks up a small watch like device and starts to take it apart.

“It’s a lie.” She says, hollow. Howard stops to focus in on her. “He’s not Steve.” They’ve been married for years. Years. And he never once said, never hinted. And after a while she stopped questioning. Because he was a good man. He was supposed to be a good man. “He can’t be Steve.” And her voice breaks.

Steve asks her to marry him six months after he shows up at her door. He has a ring, it looks old and beautiful and she says yes to get him up off the floor where he’s kneeling. She’s supposed to be above this kind of display, think it’s ridiculous, but she feels warm and giddy and when he pulls her into an embrace she melts into him.

She never thought she’d have this, not really, and then he’s slipping a ring on her finger and she will never take it off.

“I want to be your everything.” Steve whispers into her hair, “I want to be the person you think of when you’re old and can’t remember your own name. That’s why I came back to you.” He says like a secret. “Why I’ll never leave you.”

“So dramatic.” She smiles up at him, and he kisses her mouth soft and sweet.

“You bring out the best in me.” He swears, then swings her up into his arms. She laughs at that too, her Steve and knows she’s found the best parts of humanity in him.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't even know.


End file.
